Day Thirteen -- Lead Me

Thunder's greetings are mostly very good. She occasionally messes up (like first thing in the morning when she's oh so excited to see me or when visitors unexpectedly arrive before I am prepared) but that's very normal for a puppy. We're practicing being more excited when we greet her so she'll be more prepared when someone exciting comes along. The Gentle Leader will help with this too.

Anytime her excitement is over the top or she is really distracted, the Gentle Leader can help control her a bit. It is not a substitute for training. It's just a tool to use while in the training process. It helps because it gives you more control over her head and, where ever the head goes, the body will follow.

She was so cute today when I got her head halter out. We've been feeding with it on every day so she's started to have nice warm and fuzzy feelings about it. I caught her eye while she was playing ball with the other dogs...

And she trotted over and stuck her nose through the loop before I was prepared for her. Silly girl...

We've just started attaching the leash to the Gentle Leader and walking for short distances with it. It's funny, I acclimated dogs to head halters all the time so I don't think much of it but, when doing it for Thunder, I realized it really did take some patience. So many people just put it on the dog, the dog panics and tries to get it off, and the owner gives up. But we've spent almost two weeks just getting her ready for me to clip a leash to it.

She still tries to paw it every once in a while but mostly she is very accepting of it.

She is happy to walk with it and I reward her periodically just like a I do in our normal training sessions.

She's working on automatically sitting when I come to a stop. This helps her to stay in a little bit better control and helps her to pay attention to what I am doing.

Now she's starting to get the hang of it. We do short training sessions so we can end on a positive note. It won't be long before we can start using it in more distracting situations.

Day Twelve -- M.O.S.T.

Attention is a beautiful thing. Without it, we're not going to get a response from any request we give our dogs. Attention is as easy as pie at home...

But it can prove to be very challenging in new or distracting situations. There is an acronym I like to use to help me remember what things can distract my dog and what things I can use to get my dogs attention back. M.O.S.T. stands for Movement, Odor, Sound, and Touch.

Movement can be toys, other animals, people, leaves, or other things that might entice Thunder to chase or play.

I can use things like wiggling my fingers, moving backwards, walking more quickly, or waving a toy back and forth to create movement that will get her attention back on me.

Dogs are good at using their noses to detect all sorts of odors. Food and other animals are usually high on the priority list. One little whiff of something and your dog could be following her nose instead of your instructions.

We can use odor by waving a treat under her nose and luring her towards us. Sometimes the smell of treats on our hands is enough to get her attention.

Music, traffic, people talking, dogs barking...anything can divert her attention.

But I can make noises with my mouth, whistle, call her name, clap my hands, pat my leg, etc. to get her attention back on me.

Just as someone or something touching Thunder can distract her, I can get her attention with a light tap on the hip or by goosing her a little bit.

Lots of praise when she does bring her attention back to me. She has a choice and she chose to pay attention to me.

I'll usually use these things in combination with one another. I'll wiggle a treat under her nose while I'm moving backwards and encouraging her with my voice. I try to do these things before she has completely committed to the distraction. I am always scanning the environment looking for things that might take her attention away. Once something is spotted, I work right away on getting her attention on me. I'll increase the rate I'm reinforcing her, increase the value of the treat, talk to her a lot, and get distance from the distraction if I need it.

Her ability to handle distractions gets better over time with practice but she's still young and it's a bit like having butterflies in the brain sometimes.

Day Eleven -- Let's Do That Again

We went out for another outing today. It's the same outing we did a few days ago but today is a busier day at the pet supply store. It's a weekend day so there will be more people and more dog distractions. She's doing a nice job sitting for things she wants (leash on, door open, getting in the car, etc.).

Thunder travels in a crate in my car. It's a safer way to travel with her and it sometimes helps with dogs who get motion sickness. She does really well in the crate. We're using the crate in the house too. We tried the x-pen but she just walked across the floor dragging the x-pen with her to see the other dogs. But she's doing well with the crate in the house. She does a little vocalization when she wants out but that is getting less and less as she figures out it doesn't work for her.

Let's get focused before we go in. We've been practicing but that doesn't mean it's going to be a cake walk when we go inside. We'll both have to work hard to keep her attention. I'll need to be scanning the environment and start getting her attention before she's already distracted. It's always a challenge when you don't have control over the direction people are walking with their dogs or people approaching trying to pet a cute little (or not so little) puppy.

Even though we've been working hard on "leave it," we probably won't use it a lot in the store...at least not today.

Because her socialization is still so important, I'd rather she explore her environment a bit and get use to the new surroundings. Leave it to Thunder to find the food right away.

She did excellent with her greetings as long as we could stop people before they approached her and ask them to wait until she's sitting. It's ok if she pays attention to you during the greeting more than the other person. I'd rather reward her periodically for sitting during the greeting than have her get up or jump up on the person.

We did end up working as hard as I thought we would. I used a lot of movement (moving backwards, walking fast, wiggling my fingers, etc.) and sounds to keep her attention on me. This would be a good environment to use the head halter. We're almost to the point where she'll be ready to use it so we may get to try that out before she heads home.

It was good to be back with friends. It was hard trying to ignore all those dogs we didn't know.

 She was glad we had gotten spiffed up to go out too...it made the dirt show up even more. I think she likes this look best.

Day Ten -- Sunshine on My Shoulders

It was such a nice day today we spent most of it outside. We were happy to have many friends here to entertain us and help with our training. Thunder is doing such a nice job of being really attentive and responsive even when there are other dogs present.

Her automatic sits for greetings are coming along really nicely. She is rarely jumping on people and she's starting to offer a sit for a lot of other things she wants. In the morning she was so excited and vocal when I was getting ready to let her out of her crate. Now she is still a bit excited but calms down quickly ands sits to be let out.

She's been enjoying  a good game of tug now and then.

And she's responding to "drop" very well...even when other dogs have a hold of the tug as well. That is not an easy task for a dog!

She is progressing well with "Leave it" too. She needs an occasional reminder but, for the most part, she's avoiding the items on the ground.

She's now progressed to leaving food that is placed right in front of her or placed on her.

Chicken strips are really tempting but she manages it well.

Thunder likes to bark a lot in play so we've tried several things to curb that a bit. I finally found what works well for her and so we practiced that a lot today. It's always nice to have a lot of tools in your toolbox so you have a lot of things to try to find the right thing for each individual dog.

So now she can share a sniff instead of sharing barks. That's so much easier on the ears!

Drink up, Thunder, there is more sunshine to soak up and more training to be done.

Day Nine -- All Dressed Up and No Where to Go

We got all spiffed up today for an outing tonight but then we aborted our mission when Thunder kept having diarrhea. I suspect she wasn't quite ready to finish the Metronidazole so we may be calling the vet tomorrow. But, regardless, we got a lot of grooming done today.

She did very well with her nail trimming. About half way through she started to get a little squirmy so we are saving the back paws for another day. I want to make the sessions as stress free as possible so, if that means we don't get all the nails trimmed it one sitting, so be it. I've been known, with some dogs, to only trim one nail a day in order to make it less stressful for the dog. It makes it so much easier in the long run because the more stressful the session, the more resistant she will become.

We graduated to the toothbrush today. She's still a little resistant to me handling her mouth while we're brushing teeth but she's happy to have her teeth brushed.

For normal ear cleaning, I like to soak a cotton ball with the ear cleaner instead of pouring the cleaner inside the ear. It's a little less shocking to the dog and helps them to be more accepting of it.

Dogs' ear canals are in the shape of a "L" so, to straighten out that canal for cleaning, I gently pull that ear straight up. I can then put the soaked cotton ball in the ear and very gently massage just below the ear. You should hear a light squishing noise. Then take the cotton ball and wipe out the ear. If there is a lot of debris or a foul odor, it may be time to see the vet. Don't forget the treats afterward because she's been such a good girl and accepting of her grooming.

And now that she's looking sharp...we're going to wait for another day to go out to dinner together.

Clearly she still has the desire to play but that doesn't mean I want to risk taking her out in public if she's not feeling well. That wouldn't be fun for anyone.

That's ok. We can hang out here with our friends instead.

Or maybe take a nap...

Day Eight -- Out on the Town

We've been working hard on our skills, slowly increasing the level of distraction. Now it's time to put our skills to the test and practice them in real life. Going to a local pet supply store gives us opportunities to practice skills in a new environment with added distractions. I know going in that the things she does so effortlessly in low to moderate distracting environments, will be more of a struggle for her here. We head in prepared to work hard and we have lost of tasty treats on hand to reward her good behavior. We start out on the sidewalk just working on attention. This are very basic skills for her but it will be difficult in this environment. Doing this ahead of time will help her to be more in tune with me before we even walk in the door.

All the employees are happy to help us with greetings. She is a ROCK STAR and holds all her sits through her greetings.

Every once in a while she gets a treat for her spectacular greetings so we can reinforce that behavior.

We also make sure she meets a wide variety of people. This will help her to learn that the rules hold true for everyone...she sits for greetings for the first person AND she sits for greetings for the next person. Soon she will be able to generalize that and she will know that you sit for greetings for EVERYONE.

And maybe she can sneak in a kiss while she's at it.

Treats aren't needed for each greeting, just really difficult greetings. Other times you can use the greeting itself as the reward. She's happy to get some additional love.

The best compliment in a greeting is when the other person says, "She just wants to look at you, she doesn't care about me." It is great when your dog is more concerned about checking in with you during a greeting and less distracted by the other person.

You have to be prepared when you are in an environment like this for unexpected distractions. Sometimes it's necessary to pull off to the side and work on attention a little farther away. Like maybe when a cute little dog comes into the store.

If pulling off to the side doesn't work, than backing away while calling her to come will help her redirect her attention back on you and make it a bit more exciting to be with you.

When it's quiet again, it's nice to be able to practice basic obedience commands so she gets use to being responsive in a variety of situations. Busy day today! We may have to come back soon and see how she does with a little more practice.